G. Heileman Brewing Company
The G. Heileman Brewing Company was an American brewery in La Crosse . It was founded in 1858 by Gottlieb Heileman and John Gund . At the height of its success, Heileman was the third largest brewery in the United States.
history
founding
In 1852 Gottlieb Heileman emigrated to the USA , where he settled first in Philadelphia , then in Milwaukee and finally in La Crosse in Wisconsin . In 1857 he worked for the Nicolai Brewery for a short time , which had to close unexpectedly. He was then employed by the C & J Michel Brewery until he opened the City Brewery together with John Gund in 1858 . The brewery was on the corner of 3rd Street and Mississippi Street in La Crosse.
In 1872 Gund left the company to open his own brewery: the John Gund Brewing Company . After Heileman's death in 1878, Reinhard Waecker took over management of the company. The total output had increased from 500 barrels in 1860 to 7,170 in 1878. In 1890 the familiar name of G. Heileman Brewing Company was chosen.
Rise and Expansion
Heileman's son-in-law, Emil T. Mueller, later became the new head of the company. In 1902 he introduced the Old Style brand , which developed into Heileman's most successful product in the premium beer sector. At that time the brewery had an annual output of 160,000 barrels. After Prohibition , Heileman got back into the beer business. By 1941 an annual turnover of 5.4 million dollars could be achieved. Nine years later it was $ 17.7 million. In the early 1950s, Heileman became a sponsor of the Chicago Cubs baseball team . At the same time, in 1952, the Old Style Lager Special Export brand was introduced.
In 1957 Roy E. Kumm was named president. The Heileman Brewery was the 39th largest American brewery at the time. Kumm brought his son-in-law, Russell G. Cleary, into the company as a consultant. In the following years Heileman bought several breweries, including the Wiedemann Brewing Company in 1967 and the Valentin Blatz Brewing Company and Carling National Breweries in 1969. A total of 18 company acquisitions were carried out from 1961 to 1987.
After Kumm's death in 1971, Cleary became the new president. In 1976 Heileman managed to position Old Style in the lucrative Illinois market . One of the main reasons for the successful launch was a nationwide strike that restricted production by competitors. In addition, the Joseph Schlitz Brewing Company gradually lost customers due to a change in the recipe. Two years later, Old Style held a 26% share of the Chicago market and Heilemann generated sales of half a billion dollars.
At the height of its market expansion, Heileman was the third largest brewery in the US, behind Anheuser-Busch and Miller . In 1981 Cleary attempted unsuccessfully to buy up Pabst Brewing Company because of its nationwide distribution network, in an effort to keep the company growing. In the same year, an agreed corporate merger with Schlitz was banned by the Department of Justice .
In 1982 Heileman bought three Pabst manufacturing facilities in Perry , Portland and San Antonio , expanding capacity, market presence and distribution channels.
Failure and sale
Despite its strong market position, Heileman's sales fell from the mid-1980s. One of the reasons for this was the increasing popularity of new types of light and imported beers. In the following two decades, the brewery was passed from owner to owner and could no longer match the success of previous decades. In 1987 the Christian Schmidt Brewing Company was bought.
In 1987, Bond Corporation Holdings Limited took over the company from Australian millionaire Alan Bond for a purchase price of $ 1.26 billion. The plan of the leveraged takeover did not work out, however. The resulting high credit burden on Heileman restricted the company's competitiveness too much. Due to differences with his financiers, Alan Bond was forced to resign in 1990. In 1991 Heileman filed for bankruptcy . The court appointed Thomas Rattigan as the new CEO . The Black Monday finally made sure that the Bond Corporation Holding went bankrupt 1,992th
By 1993 Heileman's financial position had stabilized and the brewery was purchased by investment firm Hicks, Muse and Company for $ 390 million. But even under the new owner, the brewery had to file for bankruptcy again in 1996 due to falling sales figures.
The Stroh Brewery Company took Heilemann 1996 for $ 300 million. Similar to what Stroh had done in 1981 with the Joseph Schlitz Brewing Company, Heileman was dissolved as a company and his brands were added to Stroh's portfolio. In order to reduce costs, Stroh ended its cooperation with several former Heilemans distribution partners, as these overlapped with Stroh's sales network. In addition, the unprofitable brands of the Heileman brewery were no longer continued. At that time, Stroh signed a license agreement with Pabst, who completely outsourced their production. The Heileman brewery became the new production site for Pabst beer.
In 1999 the new owner Stroh Brewery Company was also bought up by the large breweries Pabst Brewing Company and Miller Brewing Company. The reasons for this were the accumulated debt burden, the end of the license agreement with Pabst and the ongoing price war among competitors. On August 6, 1999, production in La Crosse was closed.
Today the former Heileman brewery in La Crosse is used by the City Brewing Company . They chose their company name consciously in memory of the founding name of Heileman. City Brewing Company has no rights in Heileman products.
Beverage brands
The beverage brands of the Heileman brewery are now produced by Pabst, Miller or third parties. Some brands were discontinued:
- Miller
- Blitz-Weinhard
- Mickey's
- Pabst
- Black label
- Blatz
- Lone Star
- National bohemian
- Old style
- Rainier Beer
- Rheingold, now Rheingold Breweries
- Special export
- Stag
- Third manufacturer
- Grain Belt, Minnesota Brewing Company
- Not continued
- Knickerbocker
- National Premium
- Ortlieb's
- Schmidt's
- Wiedemann
Biggest six-pack in the world
In 1969 the Heileman brewery built six storage tanks in a six-pack arrangement and painted them in the colors of the Old Style brand . The brewery used these tanks for marketing purposes (“World's Largest Six-Pack”) and for storage. When the City Brewing Company took over the brewery, the tanks were repainted in the colors of the city beer La Crosse Lager .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Old Style: History , accessed June 20, 2013
- ^ A b Consul Willshire Butterfield: History of La Crosse County, Wisconsin , pp. 642–644 Available online on Google Books , accessed June 20, 2013
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Jack Snead Blocker, David M. Fahey, Ian R. Tyrrell: Alcohol and Temperance in Modern History: An International Encyclopedia, Volume 1 , pp. 292–293 Available online on Google Books ( English), accessed June 20, 2013
- ↑ David G. Moyer: American Breweries of the Past , p. 33 Available online on Google Books , accessed June 20, 2013
- ^ Amy Mittelman: Brewing Battles: The History of American Beer , p. 155 Available online on Google Books , accessed June 21, 2013
- ^ Victor J. Tremblay, Carol Horton Tremblay: The US Brewing Industry: Data and Economic Analysis , p. 98, available online at Google Books , accessed June 21, 2013
- ^ G. Heileman Brewing Company , accessed June 19, 2013
- ^ Roadside America: Return of the World's Largest Six Pack , accessed June 20, 2013